Is working at Costco really all it's cracked up to be?
The only way to find out is from employees themselves, and luckily, they're not afraid
to talk about their experiences.
Here's a look at what it's really like to work at Costco, straight from the people who
know best.
Working at Costco might seem like a simple job, but employees tell a different story:
apparently, it can be as exhausting as an intense gym session.
Rachael, a Costco employee in Colorado, told Mental Floss that employees are the ones who
do all the heavy-lifting.
According to her:
"When you see pallets stacked with 50-pound bags of flour or sugar or dog food or cat
litter, a lot of that stuff had to be stacked by hand by employees before the store opens.
Ditto for those giant stacks of shoes and bottles of salsa or five-gallon jugs of cooking
oil.
It's a lot of hard work."
Costco is a membership-based store, meaning you have to pay an annual fee in order to
get a card that allows you to shop there and enjoy all of those discounted prices.
Every customer is expected to show their membership card to an employee before they walk through
the doors.
"Welcome to Costco.
I love you."
However, that doesn't mean customers are always happy about doing it.
One Costco employee explained on Reddit that one of the hardest jobs there is working the
entrance simply because of the people they encounter.
The employee said that customers tend to make things harder for the card checkers by not
showing their card, blocking the entrance when taking out their card, or forgetting
their card and trying to get in anyway.
Another user explained that one of the most common issues that comes up is people trying
to shop there even if they aren't members.
Sorry folks, but that's not how it works!
Costco is known for having a terrific workplace environment, but it's not just the pay that
makes it awesome.
Employees enjoy lots of great benefits, and plenty of perks on the job as well.
One of the best has to be the fact that they're able to shop after hours.
Kathleen, a Costco employee in Washington, told Mental Floss:
"You can shop after hours, and a lot of employees do that.
You just bring your cart to the front register."
Costco stores actually keep their member service counter open after the store closes for exactly
that reason.
Oh, and you can't forget about the fact that employees have access to all of the wonderful
free samples that make weekend Costco shopping that much better — and you better believe
they take advantage of them.
One Reddit user who claimed to have worked there for over seven years said they ate a
lot of samples, and added a helpful tip to non-employees:
"The demo people are there every day but Saturday and Sunday are the prime times to get free
grub."
Another Reddit user who had worked at Costco for over two years jokingly said that workers
there called the samples the "Employee Buffet."
Every Costco has the same policy for customers who are leaving the store: after you pay and
as you are walking out, an employee checks over your receipt and looks at the items in
your cart.
But have you ever wondered how they do it so quickly?
Apparently, they aren't reading the entire receipt.
Thomas, an employee in California, told Mental Floss:
"We're looking for items on the bottom of the cart, big items like TVs or alcohol."
One Reddit user talked about it on a thread, saying that employees count the number of
things in your cart and see if it's the same number as on the receipts.
They also said that they check for expensive items:
"Lots of people I knew just checked for the expensive things and didn't bother with anything
else."
Another user said that they also look for doubles, saying:
"Most of what we find is actually errors with scanning.
Had someone accidentally key in the number for a $1000 item instead of a bag of avocados
once."
Costco employees are generally pretty happy, but one very common complaint is that their
technology seems to be very outdated across the board.
One employee said on Reddit:
"Whoever is in charge of technological advancement and taking the digital systems that run our
entire company into the future needs to take a step back and reevaluate what we're doing."
Another employee complained about not being able to look at their schedules or submit
time off online and not having a tablet to use to check inventory, adding:
"Why do our computers and registers look like they came from the '80s?
Why is everything done by paper and pencil?
I get that this kind of stuff is expensive to upkeep, and by not doing tech upgrades
we keep our prices low, but it's time to join the rest of the world."
"Password entered."
It's pretty common knowledge that, in most stores, there's more inventory in the back
— all you have to do is ask an employee to check for you.
Well, at Costco, what you see is what they have.
One Costco employee told Reader's Digest:
"Costco is a 'warehouse' store in a literal sense — we don't have any additional storage
from what you see on the shelves.
If it's not there, don't ask us to check the 'back.'
The 'back' doesn't exist."
One employee said something similar on Reddit, adding that if you notice the item is up on
the pallets on the higher shelves, you can try asking someone to get them down, but they
may not.
The employee said:
"I've been told they don't take down pallets from the shelves because it would require
driving the forklifts through all the customer foot traffic, roping off the aisle and the
one opposite for safety and would generally cause too much hassle.
If something is up high and there's none on the floor, just go back the next day for it."
"I didn't really know we carried these."
"These?
You guys got everything in here."
"Well, we sure do, is it working out for you?"
If you've ever worried about how your food is being handled at Costco, let this reassure
you: employees say food safety is a really big deal to them.
Employee Rachael told Mental Floss:
"If an employee forgets to remove their apron before exiting the department, they must remove
that apron, toss it into the hamper, and put on a fresh apron because now it's contaminated."
She also said that there are rules against employees wearing nail polish near food prep,
as it could chip and fall into the food.
A Costco employee from Florida echoed the same sentiment.
They told Business Insider:
"We are very strict on food quality and safety.
We have safety walks every hour that audit the temperatures of our food coolers and storage.
Our famous rotisserie chickens are not allowed to be sold after two hours of sitting in the
warmer."
"I will buy you a Costco rotisserie chicken.
… Sold!"
Yes, the rumors are true: Working at Costco really does mean terrific benefits, and employees
can't stop raving about them.
Meghan, a former Costco employee, told Yahoo News that there were more than great hourly
wage and healthcare benefits.
Meghan said:
"While I was at Costco, they gave employees complimentary memberships to the store."
One employee told Business Insider that they got paid holidays, a generous 401(k) plan,
and affordable healthcare that includes dental and vision insurance.
An employee with over seven years of experience told Reddit users that employees get a free
executive membership.
Another random perk?
One employee says they're given a very special gift for the start of the holiday season:
"We get free turkeys for Thanksgiving.
I didn't even know that before I started working there.
It's a nice perk."
We have to agree with that!
Costco is known for their fantastic flexible return policy, which comes with very few restrictions.
But be wary of taking advantage of it… employees say they'll start to notice if you're returning
too many items.
California employee Thomas told Mental Floss they can tell just by the way you talk:
"When someone comes in to return something without a receipt and they go, 'Oh, you can
look it up on my account.'
that's a tell.
It tells me you return so much stuff that you know what we can find on the computer."
Another employee with over two years of experience there explained on Reddit that while they
don't flag people, they "can make comments on your membership."
The employee said:
"If a return was over $100 we had to call a supervisor to sign off on it.
If it was over $300 we had to call a manager.
The supes and managers were so busy though and got so tired of this rule that they literally
only came down to sign the receipt.
They would ask us 'Do you think it's okay?' and if we said we were okay with it then they
would sign it."
Most of the time, a trip to Costco means you're ready to stock up on enough food and supplies
to last a few weeks.
But sometimes, you go to just grab a few things — and those times, you've probably thought
it would be nice to have an express line to go to.
There's a legit reason most stores don't have them, though.
Costco employee Rachael told Mental Floss that the supervisor in charge gets a head
count of customers, so they always know how many people are in the store and have an idea
of when they'll be checking out.
They can then determine how many registers should be open.
They also don't hesitate to pull employees from other departments to help out with lines.
There are plenty of great things about working at Costco, but make no mistake, it isn't a
walk in the park — employees work hard for those benefits.
Aside from the physical labor, many employees say they find the job to be pretty stressful.
An anonymous employee wrote on Quora,
"Costco is an incredibly stressful place to work and you are required as full time to
work for 40 hours a week, generally during the most inconvenient times and often on weekends
and evenings, giving you very little time away from work."
Another employee echoed that sentiment:
"If you do night cleanup or morning stocking you will be under very tight deadlines to
get your work done on time and you will often face situations where you are screwed no matter
what you do.
It can be very stressful and takes a certain mental fortitude.
I could only do it for six years before I burned out and had to move on."
Even if the job is stressful, most employees say the job is still well worth it.
One employee from Arizona told Business Insider:
"I legitimately love my job."
An employee who worked for the company for over two years told Reddit:
"The company really does strive to treat their employees fairly...
It's actually nearly impossible for them to fire you if you've been there for a few years."
However according to one employee on Reddit, the best thing about working there is simple:
"The fact that everything is done properly.
There is a real emphasis on doing things the right way rather than the fastest or cheapest.
It's a real testament to the quality of this company."
Or to put it another way:
"It's fun, everybody knows everybody, they talk about values, and they have good snacks."
"Sounds like a place we both know and love."
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